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Ingredients: Aged Pickled Scotch Bonnet Peppers (Pepper, Vinegar, Salt), Water, Salt, Modified Corn Starch, Vinegar, Onion Powder, Mustard, Potassium Sorbate as a Preservative, Soybean Oil, Spices, Xanthan Gum, Colour (FD&C Yellow No. 5).
Matouk’s is a bit elusive. You’ll find their products for sale on most websites that sell hot sauces, but you won’t find a website for the company – no Facebook page, no Twitter account…nothing.
Matouk’s is based in Trinidad and Tobago, and they produce Caribbean-style hot sauces. So, when the label says “West Indian,” you know it’s authentic, made right in the heart of the Caribbean. They always use aged pickled scotch bonnet chilies, which give their products a distinctive Matouk’s thing – and make them deceptively hot.
One of my favorite restaurants always stocks the condiment caddies on its tables with Matouk’s, usually either their Salsa Picante or Calypso Sauce. Since I enjoy these sauces on a regular basis, I wanted to explore their other products. A quick Google search revealed that Flambeau Sauce is the hottest one that they make, and a local specialty shop happened to have just gotten a few bottles in stock, so that’s what led to this review.
First of all, I could do without some of the ingredients, namely the preservatives and artificial colors. It’s definitely not all-natural. But that’s usually the price paid for mass production; the manufacturers need the product to be shelf stable and retain its color for long periods of time. I’ll try to let it slide this time…especially because I thoroughly enjoyed this sauce.
The packaging is nothing to write home about, though I do appreciate the scotch bonnet on the label. It also comes in quite a large glass bottle with a conical neck and metal cap, a style more often used for ketchup than hot sauce. More on that in a moment…
The sauce smells great. It’s very sharp. The strong smell of the scotch bonnets is competing with a vinegary pickle-juice smell. It’s slightly mustardy, and there’s a hint of onion. You know how you sniff something that has a very pungent aroma, put it down, and find that you want to pick it up and smell it again because you get such a kick out of it? It’s sort of like that.
I can’t say enough good things about the consistency. It’s very viscous and sort of fluffy, with lots of pulp and seeds. The closest thing I can think of is a thick tomato sauce, just shy of tomato paste. It’s no doubt the cornstarch and xanthan gum that create this texture. It stands up on a spoon. When I overfilled my spoon and the sauce went over the sides, a big glob of it still stuck to the bottom. This consistency conspired with a light slipperiness from the soybean oil to give the sauce a really nice mouthfeel.
Flavor-wise, it’s what you might imagine when you read “aged pickled scotch bonnet peppers.” It has that distinctive scotch bonnet taste – which most people unfamiliar with scotch bonnets will recognize from jerk-style dishes – but it also tastes, well, pickled. True to its smell, the sauce is sharp, vinegary, slightly sour, and somewhat mustardy – but it’s very full-bodied and pretty salty. “Vinegary” probably isn’t what most people want to hear, but trust me, it really works for this sauce, and the flavor of the chilies is still up front. In sort, it tastes fantastic. While the scotch bonnets give it a Caribbean feel, this isn’t just a Caribbean sauce. It has a flavor that would go well with a wide variety of savory dishes.
It’s quite hot, definitely the hottest one Matouk’s makes. There’s a high concentration of chilies in here. The heat comes on pretty quickly and lasts for a while. Fifteen minutes after I ate a big spoonful, I still felt warm and was slightly sticky from sweat. That said, it’s not extraordinarily hot, so a hot sauce lover will have no problem slathering this on food, and the average person ought to be able to enjoy it sparingly. But because this sauce imparts so much flavor and because it’s pretty salty, you don’t need to use very much if you want the flavor of your food to come through.
Finally, it’s worth pointing out that Flambeau Sauce is a great value. At 10 fl oz and around $6, it’s twice the size of a typical bottle of hot sauce and half the price. You really can’t beat that.
Bottom line: Matouk’s West Indian Flambeau Sauce smells and tastes delicious. It’s vinegary, salty, slightly mustardy, and tastes “pickled,” but the flavor of the scotch bonnets shines through. It’s very hot, but no flavor is sacrificed. The thick and pasty consistency is phenomenal. And you get a lot of sauce for little money. Go for it!
CHILIPHILE 